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US, UAE Discussed Lifting Assad Sanctions in Exchange for Break With Iran, Sources Say
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad meets with Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, in Damascus, Syria, Dec. 1, 2024. Photo: SANA/Handout via REUTERS
The US and the United Arab Emirates have discussed with each other the possibility of lifting sanctions on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad if he peels himself away from Iran and cuts off weapons routes to Lebanon’s Hezbollah, five people familiar with the matter said.
The conversations intensified in recent months, the sources said, driven by the possible expiry on Dec. 20 of sweeping US sanctions on Syria and by Israel’s campaign against Tehran’s regional network, including Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza, and Iranian assets in Syria.
The discussions took place before anti-Assad rebels swept into Aleppo last week in their biggest offensive in Syria for years.
According to the sources, the new rebel advance is a signal of precisely the sort of weakness in Assad‘s alliance with Iran that the Emirati and US initiative aims to exploit. But if Assad embraces Iranian help for a counter-offensive, that could also complicate efforts to drive a wedge between them, the sources said.
Iran‘s foreign minister Abbas Araqchi visited Syria on Sunday in a show of support for Assad, and UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan spoke to Assad by phone about latest developments at the weekend.
For this story, Reuters spoke to two US sources, four Syrian and Lebanese interlocutors, and two foreign diplomats who said the US and UAE see a window to drive a wedge between Assad and Iran, which helped him recapture swathes of his country during the civil war that erupted in 2011.
Lebanese media have reported that Israel had suggested lifting US sanctions on Syria. But the UAE initiative with the US has not previously been reported. All of the sources spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the back-room diplomacy.
Syria’s government and the White House did not respond to questions from Reuters. The UAE referred Reuters to its statement on bin Zayed’s call with Assad.
The UAE has taken a leading role in rehabilitating Assad among the mainly Sunni Muslim Arab states that shunned him after he accepted help from Shi’ite, non-Arab Iran to put down the Sunni-led rebellion against him.
The Emirates hosted Assad in 2022, his first visit to an Arab country since the start of the war, before the Arab League reinstated Syria’s membership.
The UAE has long hoped to distance Assad from Iran and wants to build business ties with Syria, but US sanctions have hampered those efforts, the sources said.
A senior regional diplomat briefed by Tehran told Reuters Iran had been informed “about behind-the-scenes efforts by some Arab countries to isolate Iran … by distancing Syria from Tehran.”
The diplomat said those efforts were linked to offers of possible sanctions relief by Washington.
‘CARROT AND STICK’
Hezbollah, an internationally designated terrorist group, and its patron Iran have intervened in Syria since 2012 to protect Assad against Sunni rebels — but their bases and weapons shipments through Syria have been repeatedly hit by Israel, which has sought to weaken Iran across the region.
In recent months, Hezbollah withdrew fighters from Syria, including the north, to focus on battling Israel in southern Lebanon. The rebels who swept this week into Aleppo pointed to the Hezbollah withdrawal as one of the reasons why they faced little resistance from government forces.
A US source familiar with the matter said White House officials discussed an overture with Emirati officials, citing the UAE‘s interest in financing Syria’s reconstruction and Assad‘s “weakened position” after Israel’s offensive against Hezbollah.
The possibility of sanctions relief for Assad, while Israel was hitting Iran‘s allies, created an “opportunity” to apply a “carrot-and-stick approach” to fracture Syria’s alliance with Iran and Hezbollah, the US source said.
SANCTIONS RELIEF
The US placed sanctions on Syria after Assad cracked down against protests against him in 2011, and the sanctions were repeatedly tightened in the years of war that followed. The toughest, known as the Caesar Act, passed Congress in 2019.
The Caesar sanctions apply across Syrian business sectors, to anyone dealing with Syria regardless of nationality and to those dealing with Russian and Iranian entities in Syria.
Assad said they amounted to economic warfare, blaming them for the Syrian currency’s collapse and drop in living standards.
The sanctions will “sunset” — or expire — on Dec. 20 unless renewed by US lawmakers.
Part of the recent American-Emirati discussions centered on allowing Caesar sanctions to expire without renewal, said the US source and three of the Syrian interlocutors.
One Syrian interlocutor said the UAE had raised letting them expire with White House officials two months ago, after having unsuccessfully pushed for at least two years of sanctions relief for Assad after a deadly earthquake in Feb. 2023.
Mohammad Alaa Ghanem, a Syrian activist in Washington, DC with the Citizens for a Secure and Safe America, told Reuters his group had been working to extend the Caesar sanctions and assessed they had bipartisan support to do so.
“We’ve been in talks over this for the past couple of months, although of course no political outcome in a town like Washington can be guaranteed 100 percent,” he said.
Arab states have other potential avenues to reward Assad for distancing himself from Iran.
A foreign diplomat based in the Gulf told Reuters both the UAE and Saudi Arabia had in recent months offered “financial incentives” to Assad to split with Iran, saying they could not have been made without coordination with Washington.
A source with knowledge of the matter told Reuters that Syria, among other crises in the region, was a topic of discussion during Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s visit to the UAE on Sunday.
A Lebanese interlocutor said the UAE had also pledged funds to help Syria rebuild war-ravaged infrastructure as a way to “pull Assad further away from Iran.”
Iran has warned Assad not to stray far.
The senior regional diplomat briefed by Tehran said Iran‘s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei conveyed a message via his senior adviser Ali Larijani, who told Assad: “do not forget the past.”
“The message served as a reminder to Assad of who his true allies are,” the diplomat said.
‘PLAYING WITH FIRE’
Since Hamas terrorists attacked Israel on Oct. 7 last year precipitating war in Gaza, Iran has mobilized its network of allies to hit Israel.
But Assad has largely avoided joining in, even as Israel struck Hezbollah targets in his country and bombed an Iranian diplomatic compound in Damascus.
A US official said Assad had “sat out” the war to avoid further Israeli strikes on Syria, and remained under “tremendous pressure” not to allow Hezbollah to re-arm through his country.
Israel has signaled that it still has eyes on Syria. When announcing the truce with Lebanon last week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel had been thwarting attempts by Iran, Hezbollah and Syria’s army to bring weapons into Lebanon.
“Assad must understand — he is playing with fire,” Netanyahu said.
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Israel Blocks Ramallah Meeting with Arab Ministers, Israeli Official Says
A closed Israeli military gate stands near Ramallah in the West Bank, February 18, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad
Israel will not allow a planned meeting in the Palestinian administrative capital of Ramallah, in the West Bank, to go ahead, an Israeli official said on Saturday, after Arab ministers planning to attend were stopped from coming.
The move, days after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing government announced one of the largest expansions of settlements in the West Bank in years, underlined escalating tensions over the issue of international recognition of a future Palestinian state.
Saturday’s meeting comes ahead of an international conference, co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia, that is due to be held in New York on June 17-20 to discuss the issue of Palestinian statehood, which Israel fiercely opposes.
The delegation of senior Arab officials due to visit Ramallah – including the Jordanian, Egyptian, Saudi Arabian and Bahraini foreign ministers – postponed the visit after “Israel’s obstruction of it,” Jordan’s foreign ministry said in a statement, adding that the block was “a clear breach of Israel’s obligations as an occupying force.”
The ministers required Israeli consent to travel to the West Bank from Jordan.
An Israeli official said the ministers intended to take part in “a provocative meeting” to discuss promoting the establishment of a Palestinian state.
“Such a state would undoubtedly become a terrorist state in the heart of the land of Israel,” the official said. “Israel will not cooperate with such moves aimed at harming it and its security.”
A Saudi source told Reuters that Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud had delayed a planned trip to the West Bank.
Israel has come under increasing pressure from the United Nations and European countries which favour a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, under which an independent Palestinian state would exist alongside Israel.
French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday that recognizing a Palestinian state was not only a “moral duty but a political necessity.”
Palestinians want the West Bank territory, which was seized by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war, as the core of a future state along with Gaza and East Jerusalem.
But the area is now criss-crossed with settlements that have squeezed some 3 million Palestinians into pockets increasingly cut off from each other though a network of military checkpoints.
Defense Minister Israel Katz said the announcement this week of 22 new settlements in the West Bank was an “historic moment” for settlements and “a clear message to Macron.” He said recognition of a Palestinian state would be “thrown into the dustbin of history.”
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Gaza Aid Supplies Hit by Looting as Hamas Ceasefire Response Awaited
Palestinians carry aid supplies which they received from the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. REUTERS/Ramadan Abed
Armed men hijacked dozens of aid trucks entering the Gaza Strip overnight and hundreds of desperate Palestinians joined in to take supplies, local aid groups said on Saturday as officials waited for Hamas to respond to the latest ceasefire proposals.
The incident was the latest in a series that has underscored the shaky security situation hampering the delivery of aid into Gaza, following the easing of a weeks-long Israeli blockade earlier this month.
US President Donald Trump said on Friday he believed a ceasefire agreement was close but Hamas has said it is still studying the latest proposals from his special Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff. The White House said on Thursday that Israel had agreed to the proposals.
The proposals would see a 60-day truce and the exchange of 28 of the 58 hostages still held in Gaza for more than 1,200 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, along with the entry of humanitarian aid into the enclave.
On Saturday, the Israeli military, which relaunched its air and ground campaign in March following a two-month truce, said it was continuing to hit targets in Gaza, including sniper posts and had killed what it said was the head of a Hamas weapons manufacturing site.
The campaign has cleared large areas along the boundaries of the Gaza Strip, squeezing the population of more than 2 million into an ever narrower section along the coast and around the southern city of Khan Younis.
Israel imposed a blockade on all supplies entering the enclave at the beginning of March in an effort to weaken Hamas and has found itself under increasing pressure from an international community shocked by the increasingly desperate humanitarian situation the blockade has created.
The United Nations said on Friday the situation in Gaza is the worst since the start of the war began 19 months ago, with the entire population facing the risk of famine despite a resumption of limited aid deliveries earlier this month.
Israel has been allowing a limited number of trucks from the World Food Program and other international groups to bring flour to bakeries in Gaza but deliveries have been hampered by repeated incidents of looting.
At the same time, a separate system, run by a US-backed group called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has been delivering meals and food packages at three designated distribution sites.
However, aid groups have refused to cooperate with the GHF, which they say is not neutral, and say the amount of aid allowed in falls far short of the needs of a population at risk of famine.
“The aid that’s being sent now makes a mockery of the mass tragedy unfolding under our watch,” Philippe Lazzarini, head of the main U.N. relief organization for Palestinians, said in a message on the social media platform X.
NO BREAD IN WEEKS
The World Food Program said it brought 77 trucks carrying flour into Gaza overnight and early on Saturday and all of them were stopped on the way, with food taken by hungry people.
“After nearly 80 days of a total blockade, communities are starving and they are no longer willing to watch food pass them by,” it said in a statement.
Amjad Al-Shawa, head of an umbrella group representing Palestinian aid groups, said the dire situation was being exploited by armed groups which were attacking some of the aid convoys.
He said hundreds more trucks were needed and accused Israel of a “systematic policy of starvation.”
Overnight on Saturday, he said trucks had been stopped by armed groups near Khan Younis as they were headed towards a World Food Programme warehouse in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza and hundreds of desperate people had carried off supplies.
“We could understand that some are driven by hunger and starvation, some may not have eaten bread in several weeks, but we can’t understand armed looting, and it is not acceptable at all,” he said.
Israel says it is facilitating aid deliveries, pointing to its endorsement of the new GHF distribution centers and its consent for other aid trucks to enter Gaza.
Instead it accuses Hamas of stealing supplies intended for civilians and using them to entrench its hold on Gaza, which it had been running since 2007.
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Hamas Seeks Changes in US Gaza Proposal; Witkoff Calls Response ‘Unacceptable’
US President Donald Trump’s Middle East envoy-designate Steve Witkoff gives a speech at the inaugural parade inside Capital One Arena on the inauguration day of Trump’s second presidential term, in Washington, DC, Jan. 20, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Carlos Barria
Hamas said on Saturday it was seeking amendments to a US-backed proposal for a temporary ceasefire with Israel in Gaza, but President Donald Trump’s envoy rejected the group’s response as “totally unacceptable.”
The Palestinian terrorist group said it was willing to release 10 living hostages and hand over the bodies of 18 dead in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons. But Hamas reiterated demands for an end to the war and withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, conditions Israel has rejected.
A Hamas official described the group’s response to the proposals from Trump’s special Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff as “positive” but said it was seeking some amendments. The official did not elaborate on the changes being sought by the group.
“This response aims to achieve a permanent ceasefire, a complete withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, and to ensure the flow of humanitarian aid to our people in the Strip,” Hamas said in a statement.
The proposals would see a 60-day truce and the exchange of 28 of the 58 hostages still held in Gaza for more than 1,200 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, along with the entry of humanitarian aid into the enclave.
A Palestinian official familiar with the talks told Reuters that among amendments Hamas is seeking is the release of the hostages in three phases over the 60-day truce and more aid distribution in different areas. Hamas also wants guarantees the deal will lead to a permanent ceasefire, the official said.
There was no immediate response from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office to the Hamas statement.
Israel has previously rejected Hamas’ conditions, instead demanding the complete disarmament of the group and its dismantling as a military and governing force, along with the return of all 58 remaining hostages.
Trump said on Friday he believed a ceasefire agreement was close after the latest proposals, and the White House said on Thursday that Israel had agreed to the terms.
Saying he had received Hamas’ response, Witkoff wrote in a posting on X: “It is totally unacceptable and only takes us backward. Hamas should accept the framework proposal we put forward as the basis for proximity talks, which we can begin immediately this coming week.”
On Saturday, the Israeli military said it had killed Mohammad Sinwar, Hamas’ Gaza chief on May 13, confirming what Netanyahu said earlier this week.
Sinwar, the younger brother of Yahya Sinwar, the group’s deceased leader and mastermind of the October 2023 attack on Israel, was the target of an Israeli strike on a hospital in southern Gaza. Hamas has neither confirmed nor denied his death.
The Israeli military, which relaunched its air and ground campaign in March following a two-month truce, said on Saturday it was continuing to hit targets in Gaza, including sniper posts and had killed what it said was the head of a Hamas weapons manufacturing site.
The campaign has cleared large areas along the boundaries of the Gaza Strip, squeezing the population of more than 2 million into an ever narrower section along the coast and around the southern city of Khan Younis.
Israel imposed a blockade on all supplies entering the enclave at the beginning of March in an effort to weaken Hamas and has found itself under increasing pressure from an international community shocked by the desperate humanitarian situation the blockade has created.
On Saturday, aid groups said dozens of World Food Program trucks carrying flour to Gaza bakeries had been hijacked by armed groups and subsequently looted by people desperate for food after weeks of mounting hunger.
“After nearly 80 days of a total blockade, communities are starving and they are no longer willing to watch food pass them by,” the WFP said in a statement.
‘A MOCKERY’
The incident was the latest in a series that has underscored the shaky security situation hampering the delivery of aid into Gaza, following the easing of a weeks-long Israeli blockade earlier this month.
The United Nations said on Friday the situation in Gaza is the worst since the start of the war 19 months ago, with the entire population facing the risk of famine despite a resumption of limited aid deliveries earlier this month.
“The aid that’s being sent now makes a mockery of the mass tragedy unfolding under our watch,” Philippe Lazzarini, head of the main U.N. relief organization for Palestinians, said in a message on X.
Israel has been allowing a limited number of trucks from the World Food Program and other international groups to bring flour to bakeries in Gaza but deliveries have been hampered by repeated incidents of looting.
A separate system, run by a US-backed group called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, has been delivering meals and food packages at three designated distribution sites.
However, aid groups have refused to cooperate with the GHF, which they say is not neutral, and say the amount of aid allowed in falls far short of the needs of a population at risk of famine.
Amjad Al-Shawa, head of an umbrella group representing Palestinian aid groups, said the dire situation was being exploited by armed groups which were attacking some of the aid convoys.
He said hundreds more trucks were needed and accused Israel of a “systematic policy of starvation.”
Israel denies operating a policy of starvation and says it is facilitating aid deliveries, pointing to its endorsement of the new GHF distribution centers and its consent for other aid trucks to enter Gaza.
Instead it accuses Hamas of stealing supplies intended for civilians and using them to entrench its hold on Gaza, which it had been running since 2007.
Hamas denies looting supplies and has executed a number of suspected looters.
The post Hamas Seeks Changes in US Gaza Proposal; Witkoff Calls Response ‘Unacceptable’ first appeared on Algemeiner.com.